# Dyed my hair BLACK....help me reverse!



## anjanasadil (Dec 13, 2007)

ok, long story short. i have natural soft black hair which i have been dying a light brown color with golden highlights for 2 years. i got sick of the brassiness and keeping up with the color was hard. so, i decided that a dramatic change was needed. so i dyed my hair a DARK Black shade from L'Oreal Feria. Its awesome, and i loved it (a month ago) but now i'm sick of it. i want to lighten my hair up again...i dyed it three times in the past month with light shades and NOTHING showed up. my question to you ladies is, what can i do to lighten my hair? salon is out of the question due to minimum funds. i was thinking, what about taking a highlighting kit and only using the highliting solution on my whole head? any other suggestions? thanks in advance!


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## puncturedskirt (Dec 13, 2007)

You could always try to bleach it, but it might be harder since it's dyed black.

I tried bleaching my hair once and it didn't do much and damaged it a bit. (My hair is black as well)

If you just wanted to bleach a couple sections it wouldn't be as bad as doing the whole head.


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## -Liz- (Dec 13, 2007)

NO!!! don't bleach anyting!! right now you just have to wait abit or you run the risk of some serious breakage. The only thing that really helps the black is to have it stripped and then yo9u have to re-dye it, but dont try it yourself, it will just turn orange and the bleach will probably ruin your hair.

at the worst, do as Patricia said and just put in alot of highlights, and then put a toner in the highlights( hair dye and 10volume peroxide)

OR wash your hair with head and shoulders to lighten it up abit, it helps to fade it. Shampoo and leave it on for a few minutes, it should lighten to not pitch black, but it wont be too drastic.

HTH sorry i cant help more i kwo how much it sucks


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## maia nicole (Dec 13, 2007)

Originally Posted by *anjanasadil* /img/forum/go_quote.gif ok, long story short. i have natural soft black hair which i have been dying a light brown color with golden highlights for 2 years. i got sick of the brassiness and keeping up with the color was hard. so, i decided that a dramatic change was needed. so i dyed my hair a DARK Black shade from L'Oreal Feria. Its awesome, and i loved it (a month ago) but now i'm sick of it. i want to lighten my hair up again...i dyed it three times in the past month with light shades and NOTHING showed up. my question to you ladies is, what can i do to lighten my hair? salon is out of the question due to minimum funds. i was thinking, what about taking a highlighting kit and only using the highliting solution on my whole head? any other suggestions? thanks in advance! Even though your funds are low, I'd say leave it to the professionals. Trying to bleach out black hair will probably leave you with some hideous shade of orange. Plus, your roots are virgin hair. So, the bleach would take to that area very well, probably leaving you with bright blonde roots with orangeness throughout the rest of your heair. I mean, if you wanna go for that look, then more power to ya. But, again, leave it to the pros. That's what they're there for. :]


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## Killah Kitty (Dec 13, 2007)

Let your hair heal/grow out/fade, if you think its unbearable do a couple highlights, but mostly I'd wait, and that way you can get some money together to get the color changed at a salon properly, by which time your hair should be a little healthier and will be able to handle what your putting it through lol. As you wait, try to love it lol, play with new makeup looks or new hairstyles and you might see it isn't so bad?


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## Saje (Dec 13, 2007)

Actually you can do the highlight kit (which is pretty much like bleaching it)

Lets just say I have had experience with it. I kinda left it there for a long time... so it was just white streaks in my hair. Then I dyed it dark brown and then I had nice hair again.


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## puncturedskirt (Dec 13, 2007)

Yeah..I wanted to do something different with my hair but i personally wouldn't try bleaching my whole head again, myself or at a salon. It's still going to damage the hair pretty bad.....but then again ALOT of girls bleach their heads like crazy but just have shorter haircuts to not make it look so bad.


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## greeneyedangel (Dec 13, 2007)

ya as another poster wrote above, I would hi-light some peices and get them really light- then dye over them with whatever shade you want. I've done it before and it does cause some breakage but just deep condition your hair afterwards


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## bruisedkiwi (Dec 13, 2007)

bes thing to do is buy the 40 volume bleach usually jerome russel brand...try 30 and do it twice if your hair is prone to damage..


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## Maysie (Dec 13, 2007)

I've had bad experience trying to lighten my hair drastically when it used to be a really dark brown. I tried to bleach it and the hair started coming out in clumps. I didn't even leave it on the full recommended time. What hair was left was the texture of straw. It was way worse to me having dead/damaged hair than having a darker color I didn't love. I had to cut it all off to chin length and then continue cutting it until all of the damage was gone. If you're going to try and lighten your hair yourself, I'd say do it gradually. Or try that Loreal color experte kit...I use it and like it...it seems to be more gentle than other at home coloring systems. What I do with the hilighting portion is choose like 3-5 pieces of hair at a time and watch the color develop, and rinse it out once its the color I like.


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## Ashley (Dec 13, 2007)

I think you should just wait a while. You're going to damage your hair so much, especially because you tried to lighten it three times in one month already. Let your hair rest for a while, save up some money, and then go to a professional.


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## Aprill (Dec 13, 2007)

If I were you, I would leave that to a professional.


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## bronze_chiqz (Dec 13, 2007)

Ive had dark brown higlights done in last year december.^ months ago, i dyed my hair in Revlon Blue Black.N my hair was tad BLACK!! Looks almost like a wig!I was soooo frustrated and started washing every day with shampoo.A friend of mine advised me to washmy hair using a strong shampoo such as Head &amp; Shoulder.I did it n to my surprise it faded within a month! And by 2nd month, i got back my original higlights and this time the colour turned awesome.Strange but I like it lolz! Never try to bleach it as it will lead to breakage.Just be patient n try this shampoo method.


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## Aquilah (Dec 13, 2007)

Originally Posted by *Aprill* /img/forum/go_quote.gif If I were you, I would leave that to a professional. Ditto! It seems like you'll need to have the color stripped, and that's best left to the pros. Especially if you want to save your hair. Also remember, the color will slightly lighten over the first few days. However, if you've dyed your hair 3 times in one month, then you DEFINITELY need to go to a pro before you end up losing your hair from severe overprocessing!


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## banapple (Dec 13, 2007)

I usually use bleach (not anymore...my hair's fried !!) but bleach would help heaps...just don't over do it.

or wait a while till the color fades a little. don't try to dye it too many times or else it won't show up.


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## KellyB (Dec 13, 2007)

Let someone who knows what they are doing try to fix this for you. My daughter is getting ready to graduate from Cosmetology school and she said dying your hair that much and then trying to bleach it would break it for sure. Just save up your money or you might be more unhappy with it than you are now.


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## anjanasadil (Dec 16, 2007)

thanks everyone for your input! i guess the safest method for the time being is to go out and buy Head and Shoulders. I have really long hair down to my back, and i cant risk having it break off because of stupid bleach....any recs for which type of head and shoulders i should get? i know they have all kinds now, smooth, curly, shiny, etc etc.


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## glmrgrl86 (Dec 17, 2007)

Okay, I am a stylist and this is going to be a process. My advice is to definitely leave the color correction up to a professional. First off, you cannot lift the black out with a lighter color. Color does not lift color. The only thing that is going to lift some of that pigment out is a lightener(aka bleach). Leave it up to the professional to decide how to go about that since your hair has already been damaged. If you came to me I would most likely just do a heavy highlight to break up that dark color. Whatever you do though, do NOT bleach your own hair! Good luck sweetie.


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## anjanasadil (Dec 17, 2007)

Originally Posted by *glmrgrl86* /img/forum/go_quote.gif Okay, I am a stylist and this is going to be a process. My advice is to definitely leave the color correction up to a professional. First off, you cannot lift the black out with a lighter color. Color does not lift color. The only thing that is going to lift some of that pigment out is a lightener(aka bleach). Leave it up to the professional to decide how to go about that since your hair has already been damaged. If you came to me I would most likely just do a heavy highlight to break up that dark color. Whatever you do though, do NOT bleach your own hair! Good luck sweetie.



Thanks! yea, i agree with you, i'm definetely NOT touching any bleach. i cant afford to chop off my hair. for now, i'm learning to live with it....and tommorow i'm going out to get myself some Head and Shoulders!!!


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## selene (Dec 22, 2007)

1) Keep in mind that being able to pull off shiny black hair is not the worst thing that could happen to you.

2) Also, keep in mind that Iâ€™ve read a TON of horror stories on msg boards that women have posted about the absolute havoc and damage that was caused to their hair due to trying to lighten hair they had dyed black.

I would highly recommend you ask sweetpeacali about this over at MUA. Unfortunately, just b/c someone is a â€œprofessionalâ€ doesnâ€™t mean they will be able to do this well for you. She is getting ready to lighten up her hair (she does a dark brown, though, not black). At least consider this: would you rather be bored with your black, albeit healthy, head of hair, or be dealing (potentially) with a hair damage disaster that there is no fix for except to wait for the new healthy hair to grow in for the next 2-3 years.

Like the one poster said above, itâ€™s pretty much a guarantee that your hair will break off in places. NOT fun! 

PS I know... I'm late to this thread.



That said, how YOU doin'??


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## anjanasadil (Dec 23, 2007)

Originally Posted by *selene* /img/forum/go_quote.gif 1) Keep in mind that being able to pull off shiny black hair is not the worst thing that could happen to you.2) Also, keep in mind that Iâ€™ve read a TON of horror stories on msg boards that women have posted about the absolute havoc and damage that was caused to their hair due to trying to lighten hair they had dyed black.

I would highly recommend you ask sweetpeacali about this over at MUA. Unfortunately, just b/c someone is a â€œprofessionalâ€ doesnâ€™t mean they will be able to do this well for you. She is getting ready to lighten up her hair (she does a dark brown, though, not black). At least consider this: would you rather be bored with your black, albeit healthy, head of hair, or be dealing (potentially) with a hair damage disaster that there is no fix for except to wait for the new healthy hair to grow in for the next 2-3 years.

Like the one poster said above, itâ€™s pretty much a guarantee that your hair will break off in places. NOT fun! 

PS I know... I'm late to this thread.




That said, how YOU doin'??





thanks selene! yea, i totally agree with you. i'm not going to risk my long healthy hair by dying it anymore or bleaching it. i've learned to cope with the darkness, hahaha....hopefully the head n shoulders i bought will strip it some. in the meantime, i'm hanging in there!!


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## LaItaliana (Dec 24, 2007)

I dont understand why the animosity towards lighteners that make hair orange.. lol but really i used colorfix from sallys to lighten my very darkbrown/red almost black hair and yes, it turned a ugly shade of yellow and orange but after i did it. BUT I dyed it light brown right after and it was almost back to my light brown natural color.. Its not like you keep the color you get with colorfix... you have to dye over the ugly. My hair wasnt damaged at all and still felt soft.

I dont think its bleach so its softer on hair.. Go over to folica.com &amp; search for color fix by jerome russel? i think its by them.. it has tons of reviews &amp; some pictures too. it saved me from my dark hair


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## Shanelle (Dec 26, 2007)

Omgosh do not bleach it even with a pro's help. Go look at my "helplessy ugly" thread. LMAO.


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## selene (Dec 26, 2007)

I know of one person who successfully used colorfix to lighten her hair a few shades (I'm NOT saying that no one else has, I'm just saying that I only know one person that has). That was the sweetpeacali I mentioned in the post above. The lighter hair she achieved, though, is not a drastic change.


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## claire20a (Dec 26, 2007)

I'd be interested to hear how you get on with the head and shoulders... I dyed my hair last week with a semi-permanent "iced chocolate" shade and it looks like a black wig (why do colours never turn out how they look on the box)? My hair is quite dark naturally but I had some caramel highlights that had seriously regrown and needed a quick fix for christmas (couldn't find time for a salon appointment). I was wondering whether semi-permanent dyes actually come out within 24 washes like it says on the box or whether they fade out?? I've washed my hair several times and haven't seen any fade yet...


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